Historical Contributions

Throughout Earths history, man has tried to understand the Earth and the heavens. Ancient people such as the Greeks and Egyptians did not always know that the Earth rotates and revolves as it moves through space. Many ancient peoples believed that the Earth was the center of the universe and the Sun, stars, and planets revolved around it. This is called an Earth-centered model. It is easy to see why early people believed this way. As we stand on the Earth, we cannot feel it moving through space. All we can see is that the Sun, stars, and moon constantly move across the sky. From our perspective here on Earth, everything appears to be moving except us! We can trace an early history of the solar system by checking out the background of the scientists who contributed to our knowledge of the solar system. Aristotle was a Greek astronomer who believed that the Earth was the center of the entire universe. As he studied the sky, he saw the stars, Sun, and Moon move across the heavens. He hypothesized that all of these celestial bodies moved around a fixed center point. This fixed center point was Earth. Ptolemy was an Egyptian astronomer who also believed in an Earth-centered model. revolved around it. Ptolemys beliefs about the universe were accepted as truth until the 1500s when a man by the name of Copernicus challenged the Earth-centered model. planets, revolved around it. space science. After Copernicus came an Italian astronomer by the name of Galileo. Galileo believed that the Earth-centered model was true until he began to make improvements to his telescope. With the help of his new and improved version of the telescope, Galileo was able to study the heavens and see, for the first time, clear evidence that Copernicus Sun-centered model was correct. Modern astronomy was born! Copernicus, a Polish astronomer, hypothesized that the Sun was the center of the solar system and that the Earth, along with other This was the beginning of the Sun-centered model and modern Ptolemy

hypothesized that the Earth was round and unmoving as the Sun and other heavenly bodies

Celestial Bodies

For thousands of years, humans have been looking at the heavens and trying to make sense of what they saw. As a result, there have been many different beliefs about our planet and its relation to the universe. We now know that the Earth belongs to a system of planets that orbit a star we call the Sun. Our solar system consists of the Sun, planets, their moons, asteroids, comets, and meteors. Each of these bodies has its own unique characteristics. seen in pictures taken by the Hubble Telescope. Gravity, the pull between two objects, holds our solar system together. The larger the bodies (objects) the stronger the gravitational pull. Earths gravity is what keeps you from floating into space. This same force keeps the planets and their moons in orbit. Our Sun is an average-sized, yellow star that is approximately 4 billion years old. Dont let the words average-sized fool you! The Sun is about 110 times the diameter of the Earth. It is so large over 1 million Earths could fit inside it! Like all other stars, our Sun is a ball of hot gases (hydrogen & helium) that gives off heat and light. Temperatures on its surface can reach 5,500C (9,900F)! Amazing views of these celestial bodies can be

Revolving around our Sun are planets.

The Suns huge gravitational force is what keeps the

planets in motion around it. Planets are large, round bodies with their own gravitational pull that dont give off light. They rotate, or turn upon an axis, and orbit, or revolve, around a star. The distance between planets and the sizes of the planets vary greatly. The four outer gas planets are very large, while the four inner planets are rather small and rocky. Moons are natural satellites. Our solar system has over 130 known moons. They have many of the same features as planets such as volcanoes and atmospheres. Some may even have water. One of the main differences between moons and planets is that planets orbit a sun while moons orbit planets. Other bodies in our solar system include asteroids, comets, and meteors. Asteroids are rocky bodies that orbit the Sun. They can range from the size of a basketball to over 1000 kilometers in diameter. Most of the asteroids in our solar system orbit the Sun between Mars and Jupiter. This region is known as the asteroid belt.

Comets are relatively small bodies of rock, ice, and cosmic dust that orbit the Sun. They can range in size from half of a kilometer to 100 kilometers in diameter. As a comet passes near the Sun, its ice and dust give off gas. This glowing gas can be seen in the form of a huge tail that can stretch for millions of kilometers into space. Meteoroids are smaller rocky bodies that orbit the Sun. Most are smaller than the size of a pebble. A meteor is a meteoroid that has entered the Earths atmosphere. meteorite is a meteoroid that has fallen to the Earths surface. As it falls through the A atmosphere, it burns up and leaves a fiery trail many people call a shooting or falling star.

The Planets
The planet closest to the Sun is Mercury. Not much larger than Earths moon, Mercury has a very thin atmosphere and extreme surface temperatures. Daytime highs can reach 425C while nighttime temperatures plunge to -170C. Mercury has no moons. The second planet from the Sun is Venus. Venus is similar to the Earth in size and has a thick atmosphere of carbon dioxide. It is always cloudy on Venus. Due to the greenhouse effect, Venus is the hottest planet in the solar system with temperatures reaching over 460C. Like Mercury, Venus has no moons. Earth is one of the small, rocky planets in our solar system and is the third planet from the Sun. Scientific evidence indicates that the Earth is about 4.5 billion years old. It is made up of active layers of rock and is covered by large areas of land called continents and large bodies of liquid water called oceans. Frozen ice caps are located in its polar regions. Earth also has a protective atmosphere composed mainly of nitrogen and oxygen. This atmosphere, along with a natural magnetic field, helps to shield, or protect, the Earths surface from harmful solar radiation. With its oxygen-rich atmosphere and life-supporting water, scientists believe that Earth is the only planet that is home to living organisms. Earth has one moon. Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun and about half the diameter of Earth. Because of its increased distance from the Sun and its thin atmosphere, Mars is a very cold planet with temperatures ranging from 37C to -123C. Mars has two very small moons.

Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun. Jupiter is the largest planet in the solar system; it is 300 times larger than the Earth. Unlike the rocky inner planets, Jupiter is a giant ball of liquid hydrogen and helium with a temperature of -153C. It is one of the four outer planets called gas giants. Four larger moons and a number of smaller moons orbit Jupiter. Saturn is the sixth planet from the Sun. Saturn is another gas giant with temperatures

plunging below -185C. It is slightly smaller than Jupiter and is mainly composed of hydrogen and helium. Saturn has 5 large moons, a number of smaller moons, and a huge system of rings encircling it. Saturns rings are made up of chunks of ice and rock.

Uranus is the seventh planet from the Sun. It is a gas giant made up mostly of hydrogen and methane. Smaller than the other gas giants, Uranus is only four times the diameter of Earth. It is two times farther from the Sun than Saturn and temperatures on Uranus stay around -214C. It also has five large moons, a number of smaller moons, and ten thin rings.

Neptune is the eighth planet from the Sun and the last of the gas giants. It is made up of hydrogen, helium, and methane and has a temperature of -225C. Neptune is a little smaller than Uranus and has more than ten moons in orbit around it. Triton is Neptunes largest moon.

Pluto, which until 1996 was considered the ninth planet, is now classified as a dwarf planet. Unlike the eight planets of our solar system, Pluto has not cleared the neighborhood of its orbit. This means other objects of similar size and mass are hanging around in Plutos orbit. The fact that Pluto is not the top dog in its orbital area disqualifies it as a planet, even though it has a moon of its own. The solar system is so vast; it is difficult for us to imagine the great distances between the planets and the Sun. In order to visualize very small objects like atoms, or very large objects like our solar system, we need to use models or scaled drawings. A scale is a ratio between

two distances. On a road map of your county, town, or city, the ratio or scale might be: 1 centimeter = 5 kilometers. For us to create a scale map of something as large as our solar system, 1 cm will have to equal millions of kilometers. The following chart can help us understand the relative positions of the planets from the Sun.

Planets Mercury Venus Earth Mars Jupiter Saturn Uranus Neptune

Scaled Distance (cm) 2 4 5 8 26 47 95 150

Actual Distance (km) 58,000,000 108,000,000 150,000,000 228,000,000 778,000,000 1,427,000,000 2,869,000,000 4,505,000,000

The Rotating and Revolving Earth

On Earth, a year lasts for 365 days. This is the time it takes the Earth to complete one orbit or circle around the Sun. This movement of the Earth around the Sun is called a revolution. The Earth does more than revolve around the Sun, however. It also rotates, or spins, on its axis. The Earth takes 24 hours, or one day, to spin around once on its axis. As the Earth rotates, different sides of the Earth face toward or away from the Sun causing day and night to occur. But, what is an axis? If you took an orange and pushed a pencil through its center until part of the pencil emerged from the other side, the pencil has become an axis. As you turn the pencil, the orange will spin or rotate around. We cannot see the Earths axis because it is an imaginary line through the middle of the planet. If we could see it, however, it would enter the Earth at one of the poles and emerge from the Earth at the other pole. Earths axis is not positioned straight up and down. It is tilted to one side. This is because the north end of the axis always points toward Polaris, the North Star, as the Earth revolves around

the Sun. It is the tilted axis of the Earth and its yearly revolution (orbit) around the Sun that cause the changing seasons we enjoy here in Virginia. As the Earth revolves around the Sun, Virginia experiences winter when the northern half or northern hemisphere of the Earth is tilted away from the Sun. When we are tilted away, the rays of the Sun hit us at an angle which makes them weaker. These weaker rays are not able to add much warmth to our atmosphere. Summer arrives in our state when the northern hemisphere of the Earth is tilted toward the Sun. When we are tilted toward the Sun, the rays hit us almost straight on. Rays that hit us straight on are stronger and quickly heat up the air and land. Therefore, the seasons are caused by the tilt of the Earth on its axis, the way that the Earth is curved, and the angle at which sunlight strikes the surface of the Earth during its annual revolution around the Sun.

Earths Tides
The Moon is our nearest neighbor in the solar system. It is only 384,000 km (239,000 miles) away from Earth! Although the Moon is much smaller than our planet, it has an interesting effect on our world. Have you ever built a sand castle on the beach when you were younger only to have the waves move closer and closer until they eventually washed your castle away? If this has happened to you, you have experienced how the Moon affects our planet through the motion, or cycle, of the tides. Tides are the daily rise and fall of the oceans and other large bodies of water on the Earth. Tides follow a cycle that repeats again and again. This cycle is caused by the relationship between the Earth and the Moon. As the Moon revolves around the Earth its gravity pulls on the Earths oceans. The gravitational pull of the Moon tugs on the surface of the ocean until its surface mounds up and outward in the direction of the Moon. When the mound of water has reached its highest point it is called high tide. At the same time, on the other side of the Earth, the centrifugal force caused by the Earths rotation produces another mound of water and another high tide occurs. You can compare this pulling of water on the opposite side of the Earth to what happens to clothes in your washing machine when the spin cycle begins. As the washing machine tub spins, your clothes are

thrown outward. Similarly, the water on the opposite side of the Earth is thrown outward as the Earth spins. Somewhere in between these two high tides, caused by the Moon and centrifugal force, are two flat areas on the surface of the ocean. These are low tides. The tide cycle repeats every day. Every 24 hours there are two high tides and two low tides.

The Phases of the Moon

The Earth and Moon have a number of things in common. One of the most important similarities between the Earth and Moon is the way in which they move through the heavens. We have learned that the Earth circles or revolves around the Sun and spins or rotates on its own axis. Similarly, the Moon revolves around the Earth and rotates on its own axis. Another similarity between the Earth and Moon is that neither of them produces, or makes, their own light. If this is true, then why does the Moon shine down on us at night? Unlike our Sun, which is a huge ball of hot gases that gives off light and heat energy, our Moon is nothing more than a gray ball of rock. By itself the Moon does not shine. It only shines because it is illuminated, or lit up by the Sun. As the Suns light hits the moon, it bounces, or reflects, off the Moons surface and into your eyes. This reflection makes it appear that the light is coming from the Moon itself. This reflected light makes the Moon very visible at night. It also allows us to see the many changing shapes of the Moon. The changing shapes of the Moon that we see each month are known as phases. Sometimes in the nighttime sky we see a full circle. At other times we see a thin slice of the full circle called a crescent. Sometimes we see no Moon at all. These different shapes or phases of the Moon occur because of its relative position to the Earth and Sun. As the Moon revolves around the Earth, we see different amounts of the illuminated half of the Moon. Scientists have identified eight phases of the Moon. They include the new moon (no moon

visible), the waxing crescent (small sliver visible), the first quarter (half of moon visible),
waxing gibbous (over half of moon visible), full (full circle visible), waning gibbous (over half of

moon visible), last quarter (half of moon visible), waning crescent (small sliver visible).
As the Moon moves from new to full, it appears to grow larger. This is called waxing. As the Moon moves from full back to new, it appears to grow smaller. This is called waning.

The History of Space Exploration

With the development of new technologies over the last half-century, our knowledge of the solar system has increased a lot. Lets investigate these advancements in solar system exploration. The father of modern rocketry was an American physicist by the name of Robert Goddard. During the early 1900s, he built and tested many early rocket engines. By World War II, the U.S. military began to look seriously at his work. Near the end of the war, 127 German rocket scientists surrendered to U.S. troops. Their expert skills, along with the development of long-range and intercontinental ballistic missiles, resulted in machines that could break out of Earths gravitational pull and travel into the solar system and beyond. Rocket research exploded in the 1950s. In the fall of 1957, the Soviet Union launched Sputnik I, an artificial, unmanned satellite, into orbit around the Earth. Within a month, Sputnik 2 with its passenger Laika, the dog, was successfully launched. Because Americans became concerned by these incredible advances in Soviet space research, the National Aeronautics Space Administration or NASA was created in 1958. Under its direction, U.S. rocket development teams joined forces to build and test rockets. By January 31, 1958, the first U.S. satellite, Explorer 1, was launched. The space race had officially begun! From the 1940s to the 1980s, the Cold War raged between the Soviet Union and the United States. During this time, both nations built up their military forces and developed satellites to keep an eye on each other. These early satellites were used to take pictures and monitor what the other side was up to. In addition to military satellites, the U.S. began launching weather and communications satellites by the early 1960s. The Space race did not stop with the development of satellites. In 1958, orbital missions such as The Mercury Project were begun by the United States. This was the first U.S. man-in-space program. Its goal was to place a manned spacecraft in orbital flight around the Earth. Six manned flights were accomplished. In 1962, the manned flight program was extended with the development of The Gemini Program and ten additional manned missions were completed.